People of our world: He lived in the ruins. And gave me food for thought.

01 Jul 2014

On this journey around the world promoting the idea of do-it-yourself change, and highlighting others who are making a difference, I come across some interesting characters.

People who are on their own pilgrimages ... to celebrate anniversaries, to finally see a dream, to escape, to do things I never even considered ... for a week, a month, a year.

So on this blog we're adopting a feature in which we meet some of them, and try to get to the guts of something, to give us food for thought.

People of the World. POW!

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KEVIN

I round the corner at Machu Picchu by the sacred stone and there's Kevin and DG. He was here 45 years ago, and he's showing her now.

He had just finished college and left to go walk around South America for nine months.

He lived in the ruins of Machu Picchu for 2 weeks with hippie types. Back then, there weren't a lot of tourists, and "no one cared."

"That really expensive hotel at the entrance? It uses water from the Sun Gate. It cost $20 a night then and $950 now. We would sneak in through the windows of the hotel and steal towels. We'd always return them and put them in the 'soiled' bin."

He met a lot of people who had just dropped out. He got a career that he enjoyed, he retired and now he's traveling again. He wanted to see Machu Picchu again, with DG, and visited where he lived in the ruins.

What is the most important lesson you learn on your trip?

"That it was a trip. It wasn't a life."

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(If you look closely in his pocket, you will see a mini me... He has Flat Kris and is taking her to Manu National Park to a part of the rainforest I won't see. He was definitely the right person. Wandar. Radar for the road).